Why do you make music? Is your goal eventual fame? Do you do it for yourself?

Something I find almost alarming is the self-defeatism that so many artists seem to cling to...

... It's like there's something we convince ourselves is rational about believing we'll never achieve anything.

Maybe it's because you've been in the industry for literal years, and achieved nothing of the sort, but aren't you constantly developing as an artist?

For me, at least, the idea is that I'm always growing as a musician and that leads me to becoming more widespread with each release. The goal is just to write music that I like and potentially an eventual hope is financial success but it's never been the forefront (until just now).

I dunno. I'm curious because I'm sure this has been talked to death but I'd love to see what people who have less or more releases have to say about their reasoning for making music. I'm sure it's mostly a hobby for most of us, but on the topic of mentality, do you believe in success as an artist? Or do you just make music because it's what you do?

Everything here is applicable to any form of media but music is sorta the core of this community which is why I picked it for the topic of discussion.

Years ago I got into Photoshop through a class in school. It made me happy, making things with my imagination and hands again. It was a refreshing take after I’d burnt myself out drawing in art classes. What’s more is that I didn’t have the class for a grade but rather for my own amusement and curiousity. Years went by and I experimented with more and more mediums (Maya, Cinema 4D, After Effects, Z Brush, Gimp, Fire Alpaca, Mischief, Autodesk Sketchbook, BoomTube) and eventually landed a few jobs here and there that paid significantly.

But I got bored, complacent and uninspired. I still do a thing here and there on my own time but not much anymore. I’ve taken a step back to look at my life recently and started to come to conclusions about my art and “talent”. This is what I came up with:

I did it because I could. I kept doing it because I saw things I couldn’t do. I love it because it challenges me and makes me examine my life from different angles and problem solve within my means, just like my restrictions in art encourage me to.

I did it because I could. I kept doing it because I saw things I couldn’t do. I love it because it challenges me and makes me examine my life from different angles and problem solve within my means, just like my restrictions in art encourage me to.

Adrian, that is beautiful. That quote is something I'm going to hold onto for the rest of my life. Thank you so much for sharing because that is the most impactful thing I've read about art in a very long time. You very concisely described what I would call the heart of your art and it's seriously so powerful to have that sort of understanding of your creation as a whole. It totally puts into perspective my own goals and aspirations in art and I'm going to strongly urge complacent artists I know to give that quote a read. It can seriously change lives.

Moved this thread into the music discussion place because that makes more sense for it. Anyway...

I make music because people don't buy books.

That's only partially a joke. I've been sitting here putting a lot of thought into this, trying to find a good explanation for why I chose music, but it just doesn't exist. I don't even remember how I got started with music, but now I've been at it long enough that it's simple and easy, almost second nature. It's all intuition. I've also always had these big, grandiose ideas for characters, stories, worlds, that I've never been able to effectively express in a way that others may enjoy it. So, I try to create scenes and convey feelings through music, because that's just what I know how to do. Granted, I do also enjoy diving deep in there and learning the technical aspects of it, but that's only a byproduct of the medium and my analytical brain. Years later and I still haven't bothered to learn any music theory though. It's not about the music, it's about bringing my world to life.

I make music because...I don't actually know why for sure, concretely at least. I know I like the attention and I like it even better when people tell me my song made them happy. I enjoy every bit of it, from composing, to mixing, to mastering, because building and creating something beautiful takes effort, and watching it take shape before your eyes is one of the most fulfilling things I do. It's also better than just sitting around and vegging out all day.

I've always been big into the software side of doing art things whether its digital art, animation, editing videos, stuff like that. Unfortunately, none of those stuck even though i love the end results of those kinds of things. I never really enjoyed the process of that stuff and found that i was way too impatient so i gave up kinda easily. But music has always been fun. When i get rolling on an idea i get really into it and don't stop until i hit a wall or i have to force myself to stop because its 5am and i have to go to sleep. I've mentioned in the past that i was really depressed in junior high and high school and music is one of 2 things that actually made me really really happy at a time where i just felt kinda sad and lonely all the time. I'm doing a lot better now and have grown quite a significant amount since then but music still remains fun and enjoyable to me, so i keep making stuff. yea, i want to get big. yea, i want to dj and shit and live the life. why? because id be happier expressing myself and doing something i enjoy more than i would working a traditional job that requires me going to school.

It's hard to say why I do something that I just... do. Music is the only thing that makes me feel. CRAAAAWLING IIIIN MY SKIIIIN
I mean everyone loves music. It would be wrong to say I love music more than any other musician, but out of my interests, I've definitely put the most effort into it. Circa 2009 thanks to Excision, I got into making shitty dubsteppy beats in high school on FL9, about the same time I was getting into jazz. I am the type of person to really go super ham with research when I like something, so I got deep into theory and the really complex stuff. It's kind of like porn, where you just keep refining down exactly what kind of degenerate you are, until you can't climax without original jazz fusion chords over a stupid polyrhythmic compound meter. In all seriousness though, music brings me more emotional responses than my actual life does. It's like drugs for my soul or something. An addictive one.